Discovering ownCloud Day 1 – Installation

In the first entry of this series, we will see how to install ownCloud on a regular shared hosting.

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What is owncloud?

Owncloud is a free open source platform you can use to safely store, share and sync data across all your devices, which also allows basic online modification through an easy-to-use web interface.

It’s important to notice that all files will be stored on your own webspace, with your own security and configuration, in order to have total control on it, without relying on third parties!

Installing Owncloud

Reach the official OwnCloud website and click on “Host ownCloud yourself” to reach the download page. There are multiple choices for various configurations. For the sake of this tutorial, I will download the web installer since we’ll go through the process on a shared hosting.

Next, using an ftp client such as filezilla, upload the installer script to your server. Note: make sure you place the file inside the public_html, www or httpdocs folders (or in any case, the main folder on your webspace). You can also use a subfolder, but notice owncloud will ask you a furhter subfolder level.

Then, reach the script from a browser to launch the installation process.

Basic Configuration

Owncloud is installed! It’s now time to configure it. Choose a username and password, then click on advance if you need to further configure database options. By default, Owncloud uses SQLite as storage system, so if your server doesn’t support it, you can switch to a regular mysql or postgre. Of course, you will have to create a database and user from your control panel if you choose the full database option.

We’re done! In the next tutorial we will see how to deal with the basic configuration of OwnCloud, such as creating users, quotas for storage, and alike.

Author Spotlight

Fabio Porta

Fabio has been involved in web development and design since 2005, when launched his first website at the age of 16. He’s now highly skilled in both client and server side development, along with design, and since August 2012 runs a successful website about PrestaShop tutorials and Prestashop Modules called Nemo’s Post Scriptum, at http://nemops.com